Joanna Jepson’s story is unlikely in a variety of ways. After growing up with a facial deformity, the young woman left her evangelical church to become an Anglican priest at 27 and today is the chaplain to the British fashion industry. Rachael Kohn reports.

The first chaplain of London’s School of Fashion grew up ugly. That’s a fact, but not one that was evident until she was about 12. Suddenly, her jawbones grew like they were on steroids, pushing out her teeth horizontally, pulling her chin back. Joanna Jepson learned the value people put on outward appearance the hard way.

Fortunately, two face saving operations at age 19 returned the cute-as-a-button looks of her childhood, though they did not remove the memory of the cruel taunts of her youth. ‘You are so ugly you should just go and kill yourself,’ was once written on a note to her by a boy who, she charitably notes, likely had problems of his own.

A homeless woman said she hoped Jepson would become a vicar so that one day she could officiate at her wedding. It planted a seed.

The Reverend Jepson’s personal journey was not only about her physical appearance, but also about her faith, and neither was a one way street. Although her awkward mouth undermined her self-confidence and significantly reduced her enjoyment of life growing up, she also knew it was small price to pay compared to her brother. He has Down syndrome, and he suffered acutely as the butt of jokes and slurs.

Jepson learned early that her problems were relative.

She learned a similar lesson about her church. On the one hand, the loving support she and her family received from their close-knit charismatic evangelical church saw her through those painful times. Life was worth living in the certainty of God’s love, even if the cruel comments of boorish people could cause a rush of hot tears.

On the other hand, she found the beliefs of her Christian friends and church leaders increasingly hard to accept. An overwhelming emphasis on ‘being good’ and not disappointing God was standing in the way of her own capacity to love God. While some of her friends prayed fervently, hands in the air, and even leapt up, as if to get closer to God, she felt it was ‘too noisy’.

‘Why would God need this kind of noise if he can hear our thoughts?’ she thought.

Questions mounted and she decided to enter theological college. This was not a well-worn path in her kind of church, but her parents finally relented. Volunteering for youth mission work on the streets, Jepson found that her faith grew and matured.

One day, a homeless woman said she hoped Jepson would become a vicar so that one day she could officiate at her wedding. It planted a seed.

There was one big obstacle, however: that awful clerical garb! Grey oversized shirts, dowdy robes; it was a look calculated to kill any female allure and ensure a life of spinsterhood. She would definitely have to change that.

After being ordained as an Anglican priest at 27, one of her first outfits featured a choker, which turned into a clerical collar worn over a plunging neckline.

She is a little embarrassed about that now, but it signalled something else about her: a commitment to fashion that saw her become the first chaplain to the British fashion industry, a role she took up at the London College of Fashion in 2006.

In 2010 Jepson received the devastating news that the king of British fashion, Alexander McQueen, had killed himself at the age of 40. Born Lee McQueen, a Lewisham lad from the public housing projects, his life had soared to unheard of heights but had also plunged to lows of drug use and depression.

For Jepson, his life and death exemplified the hole in the heart of an industry that often sends itself up for its emptiness and triviality.

‘That’s why I take the piss out of it, it’s just clothes at the end of the day,’ said McQueen before his death. ‘To me there’s no morals in fashion anymore because people put so much importance on fashion that all the morals have gone out of it.’

Jepson, who greatly admired McQueen’s fashion genius, also recognised in him the kind of street kids she befriended as a young pastor, kids who were often intensely aware of their personal ‘look’, flashing chains, piercings and fluoro coloured hair.

Today, Jepson heads up the Empty Hanger Project, a way for young people to explore the creative and deeply spiritual dimensions of their identity. Schools in England and America have used it as a way of dealing with multicultural differences and to prevent bullying among teenage girls, which often targets appearance.

Jepson has also confronted the taboo issue of abortion of children born with correctable defects, which for her has a very personal connection.